Wahba Crater

After some good leg strengthening in the gym and stamina building on the exercise bike, I was ready for a bit of a test. A desert camping trip with colleagues from my team and another British military organisation provided the perfect opportunity. We set off in 9 vehicles from Riyadh to drive 750km West to Wahba Crater. This is a spectacular natural feature, which appears to be a volcano that does not rise from the ground. some say that it is an impact crater, caused by a comet of meteor. There are lava flows a few hundred metres to the East of the crater and pumis rocks in and around it. The crater is over 2km wide and several hundred metres deep. It has a salt lake bed at its centre and many patches of lush greenery within it.
After a lively evening by the barbeque and later sitting, legs daggling into the crater, I went to sleep in my campcot in the open. Woken by the sun at 6am, I got up and got my running gear on. I ran from our campsite by the lava flow due East from the crater and circumnavigated the crater in a counterclockwise direction. I strayed out initially to avoid a large rock feature to the North edge of the rim, but soon got myself up on the lip to enjoy some phenomenonal views as the sun was still low in the sky. The ground was rough and undulating, but I was pleased that my dodgy knees and ankles were up tothe task. My polar pedometer read 11.3km on returning to the campsite, but this may not be entirely accurate; as I had to take shortened steps for much of the route. The run had taken me 65mins and according to my watch; I had burnt 1237kcal. My average heart rate was 157BPM, with a maximum of 175. The average would have been a bit higher, but I like to leave it recording as I cool down to see what my recovery is like.
After a bite for breakfast and some much needed water, tea and a pocari sweat, I joined most of the other campers for a walk/climb down into the crater. It was fairly tough going and some of the children had to turn back, but we got down and enjoyed the scenery for a while and took some photos, before splitting into two groups for the climb out. The first group decided it was better the devil you know and went back the way we had come. I joined the other half, who walked to the North of the crater and ascended using a prepared track which zig-zagged up to over half way, before leading us counterclockwise along a trail that brought us out where some of the vehicles had been driven around to. My pedometer only read 2.7km at this point. A small sub-group then climbed the smaller peak of the feature that I had earlier run around before heading back to the vehicles. According to my watch; I had burnt 1157kcal.
This was a huge confidence builder for me, as I had fully expected my knees to let me down. I felt full of beans, and even ran up the last part of the ascent. Chris returns from his holiday next week and I will be more than happy to send off the MDS application and deposit!